TODAY is the most important day in Welsh politics for years to come, and it is vitally important for the future of our nation that the election turnout is as high as possible.

TODAY is the most important day in Welsh politics for years to come, and it is vitally important for the future of our nation that the election turnout is as high as possible.

Whichever way you may have voted in the 1997 devolution referendum, assuming you were old enough and assuming you voted at all, the National Assembly for Wales is an institution that is here to stay.

The argument about whether it should have come into being is now a matter of history, and we have little doubt that historians of the future will puzzle over why the people of Wales agonised for so long over whether they should have a measure of self-government.

In our first sentence we used the term "Welsh politics".

The arrival of the Assembly four years ago conferred legitimacy on a term that previously had no tangible meaning. Fascinating as the comings and goings at the Welsh Office may have been, it was never more than an outpost of rule from Westminster. During the Thatcher and Major years this was brought home in a humiliating way by the imposition of Conservative Secretaries of State whose home bases were as far away as North Yorkshire.

Frustrated as we sometimes may have been by events at the Assembly over the past four years, the arrival of our first national legislative body for 600 years, even counting the heroic but hardly stable "par-liaments" of Owain Glyndw^r, has transformed our political landscape, and in most ways for the better.

Decisions that were previously taken by three ministers sitting at their desks in offices to which few ordinary people had access are now subject to the scrutiny of a 60-strong elected body. Of course the Assembly Members are variable in quality - what parliamentary body in the world has as its members people uniformly of the highest calibre? - but there are enough with talent to ensure that important matters that previously would have had no public airing are now issues of serious debate.

The Assembly's audit committee alone has saved many millions of public money through its incisive investigations of in-house departments and quangos. Members from all parties have made valuable contributions to this work in a way which shows how that overworked phrase "inclusive politics" can represent something beneficial.

The economic development committee has subjected the Objective One aid programme designed to bring prosperity to our poorest communities to a level of public scrutiny probably unheard of elsewhere in Europe. That scrutiny alone is likely to ensure that Wales derives greater economic benefit from the programme than would otherwise be the case.

Some of the other commit-tees have not performed their scrutiny role as effectively, it is true. Too much time has been devoted to procedural matters and frameworks that often state the obvious and arguably represent a substitute for decisive policy-making. But in a new institution that suffered a crisis before it was born - the loss of its anointed leader Ron Davies with all the consequences that followed - is it surprising that there was considerable initial uncertainty?

It is facile to argue, as many have, that the Assembly has failed to make an impact on our lives. Such a view derives, it seems to us, from a fundamental misconception. Those who express it were often sceptical about creating the institution in the first place and they fail to recognise that the Assembly is responsible for the management of our most important national assets: schools, colleges, universities and hospitals. To assert that the Assembly is irrelevant to our lives is as absurd as suggesting that schools and hospitals play no useful role in our society.

There are, of course, political battles to be fought about the extent to which the Assembly has made its mark, for good or ill, on the management of the national estate, but to suggest that it has no role is simply foolish.

Once that fundamental fact is accepted we can debate whether the institution should be changing things radically or whether it should simply be seeking to manage the areas it is responsible for better. But that in itself involves a political choice.

Another point that is often made is that three of the four parties which go into today's election with seats to defend occupy a small area on the centre left of the political spectrum. Ironically, of course, the fourth party, the Conservatives, can be said to have more in common with the Westminster New Labour administration of Tony Blair.

But instead of being a reason not to vote that can provide the discerning voter with another motivation for how to consider the candidates on offer. If the manifesto commitments may sometimes appear similar we should bring into play a qualitative assessment of the individual candidates seeking our vote. If you cannot bring yourself to support an at-best mediocre candidate from the party you would normally vote for it is likely that a more acceptable potential AM is available in another party whose policy programme you find largely unobjectionable.

The existence of the second regional vote also allows a mix-match approach that is unavailable at a UK general election. There are signs that an increasing number of people are prepared to split their votes between different parties, and this is a trend we applaud.

Equally, if you are unconvinced of the merits of the four main parties you can support one of the many smaller parties who are seeking support.

All of these points are made to encourage as many people as possible to visit their local polling station, for the credibility of our Assembly is at stake.

If some of the more pessimistic predictions on turnout prove to be accurate the euphoria that greeted the victory of the Yes campaign in 1997 will have largely come to naught. A body that attracts only one third of electors to vote for it - like many of our local authorities - commands little public respect and cannot expect to be taken seriously.

Any possibility of extra powers for the Assembly, a need we argue strongly for elsewhere in this paper, will be placed in grave doubt if the turnout falls to that kind of level. Arguments that a low turnout represents a general view that the Assembly needs more powers and is unworthy of support until it gets them will be laughed at in Westminster, where too many anti-devolutionists are waiting to rubbish our young institution.

We hope very much that the surprisingly high turnout of 51% predicted by the NOP/HTV poll on Tuesday proves to be not too inaccurate. There have certainly been signs of increased interest in the election over the past few days. In this respect the dominance of war coverage in the media over the first weeks of the election campaign may paradoxically increase the number of people going to the polls.

With the arrival of party leaflets through the door, many people have now become fully aware that an election is on. Having ignored it while the war was proceeding, the election campaign may seem sufficiently short not to become tiresome.

The final opinion poll also had encouraging news about people's perception of the Assembly's ability to make a difference. 76% think it can over schools and colleges, 70% over the NHS, jobs and prosperity and 68% over the rural economy. These are positive statistics that suggest people are overcoming their diffidence towards the Assembly and understand its significance in their lives.